Finally, after nearly three years of marriage, M and I are going to have dining chairs. Yes, we really are! Our dining table came with the house, as the previous owner was a cabinet maker and made the dining table himself, and left it here when they moved out. Unfortunately, they took the chairs and we haven’t got around to replacing them.

Until today!

Well, early next week really. We decided that we should look for some this weekend, so we went down to the Homemaker Centre, which is a big shopping centre with lots of furniture and homewares shops. We went into one shop, but didn’t really find anything we liked. We continued up the strip of shops, when we found one that had chairs similar to the style and colour we wanted.

We talked to the woman there, and asked if it would be possible to get the chairs made in leather, to which she said yes, but that they would cost an extra $150 per chair (I think the chairs were around $300 as they were). So we asked if the chairs that they had were easy to keep clean (they were a white, microfibre fabric). She said it would be fairly easy to clean, and then asked if we wanted white leather. When we said yes, she got a horrified look on her face and said that she would never let anyone wearing jeans sit on them because the colour would run into the leather, which would be impossible to get out.

So we went back to the fabric ones again, with M asking how easy it would be to get cat hair off them. The woman said, “I’ve got a great book - 99 ways to kill your cat.” OK, whatever. She thought she was hilarious of course, as people making cat-hating comments always do. She said that she has a dog and is always vacuuming after him. She then asked how old the cats were. When M said they were around 4, the woman said, “Do they know where the road is?”

Ummm… what?

M and I just looked at each other. Then M said “OK, thankyou” and we walked out. Rude bitch. I couldn’t care less whether or not she likes cats, but to say something like that to a potential customer is not the way to make a sale.

We then went into the furniture shop next door, and within 10 seconds found some nice cream leather chairs that we’ve measured and think will be OK for our table. And they’re on sale and in stock! So now we just have to order them, and we should have them on Tuesday or Wednesday. I’m really looking forward to our first meal at our dining table. It’s only been three years, but we got there in the end!